


moon phase

by speakingincode



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Childhood Friends, Growing Up Together, M/M, Pining, Stargazing, Tsukishima Kei-centric, Tsukkiyama Secret Santa 2017, technically a three times fic but not really
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-22
Updated: 2018-01-22
Packaged: 2019-03-08 00:45:31
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,401
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13446915
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/speakingincode/pseuds/speakingincode
Summary: What hits Tsukishima when he looks into the telescope is how far removed he is from the Yamaguchi who was at the telescope just a minute ago. Tsukishima's never cared about "pretty," but usually, he can tell what another person might find breathtaking or beautiful. With this, with the things in the night sky that Yamaguchi finds so amazing he calls him over to look, Tsukishima can't tell why they're so different. Why it matters at all.Or: Tsukishima has never cared about astronomy. But sometimes, when he and Yamaguchi are outside together, late at night, he wishes he could.





	moon phase

**Author's Note:**

  * For [FriesForYams](https://archiveofourown.org/users/FriesForYams/gifts).



> hi, [sandy](https://melonorcaart.tumblr.com)! this became a lot, and i'm not sure if this is exactly what you had in mind, but i hope you can enjoy it anyway. your specifications were really fun to work with, at least. i hope you enjoyed your holiday, too!
> 
> thanks to [levkaiba](https://levkaiba.tumblr.com) for beta and helping talk me through this fic and [wakan-nai](https://wakan-nai.tumblr.com) for telling me there was a telescope in akiteru's room. this fic literally would not exist in this form without them.

Kei is eleven years old and he's never cared about astronomy.

He understands why people make the mistake. It would make sense if he liked it, if he picked it up and obsessed over it like he did with all of his brother's passing interests, been amazed with the dusty telescope in his room like he was amazed with the dinosaur figures. But even though he did try, it wasn't something that could keep his interest. More than anything else, it struck him how  _pointless_  it was, how he'd never get to see any of it, not in a way that mattered. Never actually touching or feeling anything, except through thick nylon and panes of glass while worrying about oxygen tanks and vacuums.

Or maybe that isn't the right way to put it. Kei doesn't fantasize about traversing the seven continents and observing the animals or plants he spends his free time learning about, but it's at least a worthwhile endeavor. They're at least  _here_ , can be studied at level that matters, where they can be held and understood and explained, down to their lifestyles, diets, the way they think. Even dinosaurs were here at one point, and are still technically here, in the bones on display in the National Museum that they can break down and examine.

Studying astronomy, naming far-off planets and stars, collecting mineral deposits with robots and shuttles and satellites, Kei can't see the point. With the vastness of space, how little they know about it right now, how long it took them to understand the single planet they  _live_  on - devoting time to trying to figure every galaxy, star, and planet can't be anything more than a fool's errand. Like trying to put together a puzzle with a third of the pieces. No matter much more they learn in his lifetime, Kei knows it won't be enough. That it won't ever be enough for him to be satisfied.

There's no point to dreaming and romanticizing and  _trying_  at something you'll never able to do, to hold or have or know.

But that doesn't really matter. Akiteru is already well past his science phase, and it's not as if he ever bothered Kei about astronomy anyway. It's Yamaguchi who's enamored with it right now, and Kei knows if he tried to explain all of this to Yamaguchi, he wouldn't understand it. He'd just tell him to stop thinking so hard the way he always does. Kei's not even sure Yamaguchi would listen the whole way through. 

Not that Kei  _would_  explain it to him. Yamaguchi's newfound interest in astronomy is strange and uncharacteristic and yes, in Kei's opinion, pointless, but there's no reason for Kei to tell him that, if he never asks. 

Kei doesn't understand the reason behind most of Yamaguchi's interests, and even though he usually has no problem pointing it out whenever Yamaguchi gets him involved in them, putting strange programs on the television or making him go to strange places, something like this is... too much to explain. Not to mention that out of all of his interests, this one is probably the one he understands the most.

Still... how Yamaguchi ended up getting into astronomy is lost on Kei. Or, rather,  _why_. 

Kei knows exactly  _how_  it happened, which isn't that strange considering how recently it was. A few afternoons ago, Kei was reading the latest volume of a monthly nature magazine, and Yamaguchi had made a valiant effort to read it together with him, and then ended up losing interest. Which then translated to Yamaguchi poking around Kei's bedroom (and honestly, it was far from the first time), which then translated to Yamaguchi somehow unearthing a book about stars that had been gifted to Kei by a misinformed aunt ages ago.

It was Kei who noticed the silence first, who realized that Yamaguchi hadn't spoke in a long while and started getting concerned that Yamaguchi had passed out or hurt himself (Yamaguchi had never said he was sickly, but with how small he was, sometimes Kei worried.) and Kei missed it all because he was too distracted by an article about cheetahs. But when he spoke, when he turned to look at Yamaguchi, he was just sprawled on his floor, reading.

Kei doesn't know what drew Yamaguchi to it, Yamaguchi who'd been more interested in the people in  _Jurassic Park_  than the dinosaurs. (Kei can remember him laughing and saying " _Tsukki, that's not weird, you're the weird one!"_ ) Yamaguchi didn't talk much about it either, avoided his questions about why he found it so interesting, just carried the book around with him whenever he was in Kei's house.

Kei was curious to some extent, but nowhere near enough to press Yamaguchi on something he didn't want to talk about. He would've let it go, was about to write all of it off to Yamaguchi being strange the way he is sometimes, when the book Yamaguchi carted around caught Akiteru's eye at the dinner table and he said, "Eh, Tadashi-kun, you like space?"

Yamaguchi smiled politely but looked down, the same strange shyness in his body language, completely uncharacteristic of the way he usually acted around Akiteru. Uncharacteristic of the way he acted in Kei's house at all. "A little," Yamaguchi replied, busying himself with poking the food on his plate. 

If Kei cared more about why he was acting so strangely, or maybe cared less about Yamaguchi, he might've said something about what a clear lie that was, the way he'd carried the book around like someone might take it from him at any minute. But Kei didn't care like that, so he didn't say anything.

Akiteru's eyebrows had furrowed just slightly, and then relaxed again as he smiled in the same way he smiled at Kei when he was being grumpy or difficult. "You know, I liked it, too, when I was around your age. That things like planets that are just giant balls of toxic gas and black holes are something real and not out of a movie, it's kind of amazing, isn't it?"

Something lit up in Yamaguchi's eyes and then disappeared just as fast, something like an "mhm" escaping from his lips, his gaze still fixated at the food on the table.

"Ha," Akiteru continued, in some attempt to continue the conversation after shooting a questioning glance at Kei, "I still haven't moved that old telescope from my room." For a moment, no one spoke. "Oh, if you want, I could take you and Kei to the place I used to look at the sky! Saturday night, maybe. If you like looking at the things in that book, you'd probably like them better in real life, you know."

Yamaguchi's head perked up, in a way that was impossible to miss, and he glanced at Kei just for a second and then looked back down. "I, uh... I don't-"

And Kei isn't sure why he spoke. He didn't care anything about astronomy, had heard far too much about his brother's strange obsession with Jupiter, and hated the idea of going out late at night just to look at the sky, but... the way Yamaguchi looked at him, nervous but bright somehow, that made him certain that Yamaguchi wanted to take up Akiteru on his offer more than anything, but  _something_ wouldn't let him.

A lot of times, Yamaguchi doesn't make sense to Kei, but as long as Yamaguchi's happy and isn't annoying him, Kei doesn't mind. Maybe it's fine if that could go for himself as well.

Either way, Kei cut Yamaguchi off and said, "He wants to go."

And then Yamaguchi didn't outright deny it and Akiteru made a teasing comment about how Kei never wanted to go stargazing with  _him_ , and maybe Kei regret it a little then. Maybe he regrets it a little now, the way he's stuck outside on a chilly March night lugging a telescope stand down sidewalks and up hills but when he thinks about it... he doesn't, really. Yamaguchi is smiling a lot now, in a way he can't hide despite his noblest efforts, and Kei thinks he prefers that much more to him being strange and shy and avoidant.

"I can carry the telescope stand. Since we're here because of me," Yamaguchi offers Kei, and he can hear Akiteru barely hold back a snort. Kei would kick him if he wasn't carrying something half his size. There's a hint of the same uncharacteristic worry in Yamaguchi's voice, and he doesn't want Akiteru to make it even worse.

Not that he doesn't understand where Akiteru's coming from. The only reason he did what Akiteru said without grumbling when he handed him the telescope stand was that he pointed out that the only alternative was giving it to Yamaguchi instead, since Akiteru couldn’t carry both. The idea of Yamaguchi carrying something so much bigger than him is and was so unrealistic that Kei might be making fun of Yamaguchi for what he said if he was someone else.

But Yamaguchi is Yamaguchi, so Kei just sighs and says, "It's fine." Yamaguchi doesn't reply for a second, so Kei glances over and sees him still happy but strangely insecure. "Just keep up."

"Okay, Tsukki!" Yamaguchi says, and he sounds almost normal.

Akiteru helps them set up and goes off the settle in the grass with his cell phone after he shows them how to use the telescope, saying something about how he can't help more since doesn't really know much about astronomy anymore. Yamaguchi is standing to Kei's side, holding Kei's book open with one hand and a flashlight in the other, staring up at the sky with his brows knitted in a kind of concentration Kei doesn’t think he’s ever seen on Yamaguchi’s face. 

For a moment, Kei is at a loss, but Yamaguchi scrambles for the telescope, shifting it gently as he looks through the lens, sometimes backing up to look at the sky without the telescope and then diving back in again. Yamaguchi's expression is so serious, nervousness and even the jittery excitement gone, that Kei can't bring himself to say anything, to do anything other than watch. 

And then Yamaguchi shifts the telescope again, calms his movement, and after a second his mouth opens, just slightly, and in a breath that Kei can barely hear, Yamaguchi whispers, "Wow."

"What are you looking at?" Kei hears himself say before he realizes he's speaking, and maybe a part of him said it because he wanted to break the silence (because he doesn't care about space at all), but maybe he's... curious, too. Curious about what Yamaguchi's looking at that it makes him react that strongly.

Yamaguchi backs up from the telescope when Kei speaks, and for a second he's afraid he's broken the trance Yamaguchi had fallen into, but then he says, "Look," and pulls Kei next to him, points up at the sky, "see those three stars?"

It takes Kei a second to figure out what Yamaguchi is talking about, with how difficult it is for him to pick apart the clutter in the night sky, but he finds the three stars Yamaguchi is pointing to, situated strangely close to each other. "Mm."

"That's Orion's belt! You know him, right? The guy from Roman myths. There's a legend about how he and Diana were in love, but someone tricked her into killing him. That's kind of funny. Anyway, underneath the star all the way to the left, there's a really bright one. That's Rigel, it's blue !"

Yamaguchi's speaking to Kei, but it's like he's not even there, the way the atmosphere around Yamaguchi is. Like he's someone just there to listen, not Kei in that moment. He wonders if he prefers that to being himself. He does prefer this Yamaguchi to the shy one, anyway.

"From here, they all look white," Yamaguchi says after Kei doesn't say anything. "But in the telescope..." Yamaguchi tugs on Kei's sleeve, and he does what he's wants him to, kneeling down so they don't have to adjust the height of the telescope and moving the lens until he sees the three stars Yamaguchi pointed out earlier, and finds the one underneath he's so enamored with. "Do you see it? It's pretty, right?"

It's... a little bit blue, definitely. A little more than the stars around it. Kei wonders if he's tricking himself into thinking that. But blue or not, it doesn't really matter. What hits him when he looks at the star is how far removed he is from the Yamaguchi who was at the telescope just a minute ago. Kei's never cared about "pretty," but usually, objectively, he can tell what another person might find breathtaking or beautiful. With this, with Rigel, he can't tell why it's so different, why it matters at all.

Still, the fact that he doesn't understand it doesn't matter either. He backs up from the telescope, brushes off his knees, and looks at Yamaguchi. "You... know a lot," he says. Orion's belt, and blue stars... Yamaguchi usually doesn't bother with things that need research, just dives into what he enjoys and takes what he can get in the moment.

Yamaguchi looks him in the eye, and there's probably something meaningful in his expression but it's too dark to see.  And then Yamaguchi breaks eye contact, fixes his gaze back to the ground, and says, "Not really," and Kei knows he broke the trance.

"Why are you-" Kei starts to say on impulse, and then pauses. "Why are you so strange about this? I know you like it, you don't need to- pretend you don't, or whatever it is you're doing."

Yamaguchi doesn't speak or look at him for a long while, and Kei starts to think he's said the wrong thing. Or rather, he knows he's said the wrong thing, but he's afraid Yamaguchi won't brush off him saying the wrong thing, that he's made the entire night awkward and he'll just have to wait until tomorrow, when they'll just conveniently never talk about space or the day before again. But then Yamaguchi starts to speak. "I don't... really like space. Stars and stuff, I just... think they're pretty."

Kei doesn't say anything, just wonders why Yamaguchi is saying something like that in such a strange tone.

"It's kind of girly, right? A reason like that. I like the stories, too, but... the way I like space, it's not even cool, like how you are when you talks about animals and stuff. I don't understand most of the things about space, and thinking about black holes and things like that, they kind of scare me. Stars are just... pretty." Yamaguchi forces a laugh and rubs the back of his neck. "I didn't want you to think I'm lame."

Kei can't make sense of what Yamaguchi's talking about. He knows Yamaguchi thinks a lot about the things he does and what other people will think of them - probably because of the way everyone else treated him before - but he doesn't understand why he feels like this about stars and not  _Super Sentai_  or the weird cartoons he makes him watch sometimes.

Actually, if anything is different, he thought it would be him and everyone else in school. That Yamaguchi had figured Kei was okay to talk to about anything, which was why he did talk to him about anything, usually while following him around. It's maybe strange to think - Kei's never really considered the depth of their relationship before, sometimes even thinks of the things Yamaguchi says as weird or annoying - but that Yamaguchi is scared he might bully him, the way everyone else does… the thought stings, just a little. 

But rationally... Yamaguchi  _is_  different around him, more open and happier. It's stupid to doubt that he trusts him. This is just Yamaguchi being strange, and... something like that, it isn't really uncommon.

"But you still like it, don't you? Stars," Kei eventually says. "I don't really understand what you're talking about, what you said about it being girly, or how it's uncool that you don't know everything about space. As long as it makes you happy, isn't that what matters? Why do you have to worry about anything else?"

'It's..." Yamaguchi starts to say, after a moment passes. "I... I can't really..."

Kei sighs, just slightly, and cuts him off. He's sure even if Yamaguchi tried to explain it, he still wouldn't understand. "At least, I don't think you're lame, Yamaguchi. And..." Kei pauses, breathes in, looks at Yamaguchi, and wonders if he'll regret the words he's about to say. "I don't mind, if you want to talk about it. Even if I don't understand why you think it's so pretty, either."

Yamaguchi looks at him, his eyes wide in the moonlight, and after a second, he smiles. 

And even if Yamaguchi spends the next forty minutes showing him stars he doesn't get the beauty of and explaining the stories behind constellations he doesn't care about, Kei thinks to himself that he prefers this to when Yamaguchi is too nervous to speak.

It's better than  _Super Sentai_ , anyway.

* * *

Kei is thirteen years old and he and Yamaguchi are in different classes.

It's not that big of a deal; Kei's never been one for being dramatic, and they weren't in the same class when they met, anyway. It's stranger that they ended up together so many times in a row. And it's barely made an impact on their friendship; Yamaguchi still invites himself to Kei's house after school and looks for him at lunch.

The added distance, though, however small, has made it easier for Kei to  _see_  Yamaguchi, in a way he couldn't before. It makes sense, maybe, that it's harder to observe someone like that when they're always by your side and distracting you with chatter. And while it's not quite that Kei prefers it like this, he has a way of making the best of the situations he's in.

He rarely thinks about Yamaguchi the way he finds himself thinking about him now; big picture Yamaguchi, rather than focusing on the minutiae in his expressions, the shifts of his mood. And it isn’t as if those things don’t matter, but it's strange that Kei's spent so long missing something so big about Yamaguchi, right as he looked him in the face.

Yamaguchi's changed.

It's the little things; the way kids from his class greet him when they see him, how happy he looks when he's talking to them, how comfortable he is around other people, now. Kei thinks that if it weren't the smattering of freckles across the bridge of his nose, he might be unrecognizable from the self-conscious little boy who cried easily and was terrible at hiding it. Kei isn't sure how it happened, or when it happened, but he must have been blind to miss it.

Or rather, not blind, but... like watching the afternoon sky turn black or the minute hand on a clock; sometimes, things move so gradually, it's hard to notice them moving at all.

In some ways - in most of the ways involving Kei - it isn't that big of a deal. Yamaguchi's been open and happy around him from the beginning, save the couple of times he acted strangely because of the way he used to be. Of course a lot of things have changed between them since then, including everything with Akiteru, but Kei doesn't like thinking about that anymore. The worst of what happened then is over, and he thinks he and Yamaguchi have settled into something close enough to what they were before.

Anyway, regardless of what's changed, Yamaguchi still treats him the way he used to: roping him into doing things he usually doesn't, following him home, latching onto him whenever he notices they're in the same room. On the whole, he guesses the change doesn't really matter, but he'd prefer to know about it than not. It's good that Yamaguchi smiles when he's not around, at least.

"I can't find it!" Yamaguchi exclaims, backing up from the telescope and snapping Kei out of his train of thought. 

Kei sits up and glances at Yamaguchi. He'd sprawled out a while ago, about five minutes after Yamaguchi started fiddling with the telescope, when it became clear that he wouldn’t be finished any time soon. "I told you. The telescope isn't strong enough."

Yamaguchi turns to make a face at Kei, and then turns back to pick up the flashlight they left on in the grass and look at the book he'd brought with him. "Ogawa-kun said that he saw Mercury last week, and he's in the Astronomy Club. I think this telescope's better than whatever they have."

Ah, Ogawa-kun. Kei has him to thank for the fact that he's spending his Saturday night laying on cold grass and watching Yamaguchi barely restrain himself from destroying Akiteru's telescope. A couple days ago, Yamaguchi suggested they go stargazing, after telling a long-winded story about how the boy who sits next to him started talking to him about stars.  _"He's a little weird, but he knows a lot. Kind of like you!"_  Kei isn't sure whether not that's a compliment.

Though it... isn't really Ogawa's fault, probably. Going out at night to look at stars had become something like a ritual for them, something they’d do every six months or so. Yamaguchi had explained to him that the stars you can see are different around those times from some reason ("Because of the orbit around the sun," Kei had said, but Yamaguchi wasn't really listening.), so they should do it again. That didn't explain all the times after, but Kei's entertained more unpleasant ideas for Yamaguchi, so he doesn't mind going along with him on this.

Still, about Yamaguchi changing... Openly talking to someone he wasn't especially close to about stargazing, at school. Kei remembers the way he was with  _him_ , that first time. Whatever changed him, probably some symptom of growing up, it’s done far more than Kei could ever had imagined, back then.

"Why don't you join?" Kei hears himself ask. Yamaguchi shoots him a questioning look, makes a noise of confusion. "The astronomy club." 

Joining astronomy club, Kei thinks, would complete the change Yamaguchi's been going through. Or it would at least be the next logical step. Kei admits he's probably destroyed the possibility of Yamaguchi doing something similar with the other members of their volleyball club because of his general disposition and how close Yamaguchi tends to stick to him, but Ogawa and astronomy club - it sounds like something of a second chance. To follow through with the change.

Kei isn't invested either way; he doesn't think Yamaguchi would stop being friends with him, no matter what club he's part of, no matter how many other friends he has. It would just... make sense, for him to branch out like that.

"Eh?" Yamaguchi says, having already turned back to look at the book. "I'm already in volleyball club. Besides, you know I don't like astronomy the way they do." He puts down the flashlight and moves back in front of the telescope, shifting it carefully.

"Don't they go stargazing?" Kei asks, leaning forward to wrap his hands around his knees, glancing at Yamaguchi. He probably couldn't become an official member with volleyball, but since it's impossible to look at stars during volleyball practice hours, he could go with them then, if he wanted to.

"Probably, but I don't need to go with them. I have you, Tsukki!" Yamaguchi says, a playful lilt in his voice. It's too dark for Kei to see the grin on his face, but he doesn't doubt its presence. "Oh! I found Mercury, come look!"

Kei sighs but moves over to take the telescope from Yamaguchi. He'd been careful not to move it when Yamaguchi made space for him, so he only has to adjust the telescope slightly to find the little red disc Yamaguchi meant for him to look at. Mercury... from here, it doesn't look like much of anything, but he is surprised Akiteru's telescope was good enough to pick it up. 

He looks for a little while longer, mostly to humor Yamaguchi - he'd given up on figuring out what Yamaguchi was seeing a long time ago - and then sits back down on the grass. He's considering laying back down again when Yamaguchi plops down next to him. "It was kind of cool, wasn't it?" Kei grunts in response, in a way that isn't an affirmation or a denial, and Yamaguchi laughs. "You know, Tsukki…” he says, his voice soft and airy. “Why don't you like space?" Kei doesn't respond, and then Yamaguchi speaks again. "You don't, right?"

"I don't dislike it," Kei says, but he can't figure out why Yamaguchi is bringing it up. The times they've done this before, he was content to just let Kei listen to him ramble on. That he even knows, Kei should've suspected, and it isn't as if he's been trying to hide it... but it isn't an accident that he's neglected to mention it. The answer to Yamaguchi's question is long and... strange, maybe. 

Yamaguchi laughs again. "Whenever there's something about space on the nature channel, you let me pick what we watch. It's just strange, because usually you love things like this." 

Kei doesn't answer, just keeps his gaze fixed on the night sky.

"It's okay if you don't want to tell me, Tsukki. Just, since you come out with me anyway... thanks." 

Yamaguchi doesn't move, just looks up, and for a while, they sit like that, silently staring at nothing. Kei bites the inside of his mouth, thinks about the first time they came out like this, that he's probably being dramatic. Yamaguchi has always been fine, no matter what Kei says. (After Akiteru, he's certain of this.) That his explanation might not make sense to Yamaguchi… it isn’t that big of a deal.

"It's... pointless," Kei says, trying to think of a way to explain his feelings that Yamaguchi will understand. "Space is large and complex, and we know too little about it. Even if we both live to be a hundred years old, what they'll find out in our lifetime... it won't be anywhere near complete understanding. It's... stupid, to spend time trying to find things out about it. Better to use that energy on something realistic."

Yamaguchi doesn't speak for a second and Kei glances over, wondering if he's offended him, but Yamaguchi keeps staring at the night sky. After a while, he drops his gaze and turns to meet eyes with Kei. He laughs again, just lightly. "I... don't really get it, that thing about 'complete understanding,' but I don't really understand a lot of the stuff you say, I guess." For a moment, neither of them speak. "Still, it's... beautiful, right?"

It's not enough for Kei, for something to just be beautiful. It's never been enough. He thinks there's beauty in complexity and strength and efficiency, has never cared anything for aesthetics, but he looks at Yamaguchi's face, his expression that's too dark to make out, and thinks about it. Thinks about how Yamaguchi is a lot of things he dislikes, talkative and teasing and pulling him into things he doesn't always want to do, how Yamaguchi's changing so he’s even more like that. How none of that affects the fact that Yamaguchi is his best friend.

Maybe he understands what Yamaguchi means, just a little.

They sit there for a while, Kei's thoughts so loud there isn’t room in his mind for conversation. When they stand up again, Yamaguchi picks up the telescope, and they go home. After that, Yamaguchi doesn't join the astronomy club, and he stops asking Kei to go stargazing with him. 

Kei doesn't know what it means.

* * *

Kei is fifteen years old and he's barely come to terms with his feelings for Yamaguchi.

It makes sense in a way that Kei maybe resents, that out of anybody, of course it would be Yamaguchi to make him feel like this. Like some walking cliche: a high schooler smitten with his hopelessly oblivious best friend, who almosts ends his life every time he sits too close, or compliments him for no reason, or brushes his hand against his shoulder to get his attention, and-

No, he... shouldn't be thinking like this. For a long time he hated the fact that he realized, willed the adolescent feelings in his chest to disappear, thought of it all as embarrassing and dumb and a waste of time, but... there are times Kei sees Yamaguchi, in quiet moments when he probably doesn't even realize Kei is looking, and it feels like his chest is overflowing. And something that feels like that… Kei can’t make himself want it to go away. Even if it is stupid and embarrassing and interferes with his daily life far more than he'd want it to.

When his feelings changed, or when he realized them - Kei isn't sure which one it is - he has no idea. In the past year, everything between them has changed - Yamaguchi even yells at him sometimes when Kei says something he doesn't like, and Kei doesn't know why he finds that  _endearing_  - and there are moments, Kei thinks, that it would be easy to ascribe his new feelings to. At training camp in Tokyo, when Yamaguchi grabbed him by the collar; after their win against Shiratorizawa, when Yamaguchi yelled at him for doubting himself; maybe even just during their game against Aobajohsai, watching Yamaguchi perfectly perform the float serve he ditched him after school so many times to practice and that look of pride on his face... but to pick any one and call it the source of the racing in his chest, it wouldn't be  _right_.

Whatever this is, the way he's feeling, it's far too strong, too complex, to be summed up in a single moment. It's  _everything_ , every time he sees Yamaguchi smile when he notices he's there, every time he hears Yamaguchi call "Tsukki!" in that high, almost childish voice, every time Yamaguchi's laugh rings out, even after Kei accidentally says something mean...

Ah, that is... embarrassingly saccharine. But it's far better than being immature about it, denying it to the point of hurting himself. Kei's always resented people who told lies just to feel better, even if he is starting to understand where the temptation comes from, and he thinks that goes for emotions as well.

Though it's far from easy. Not denying it hasn't quelled the turmoil in his mind so much as replaced it with a different kind.

Kei's always considered himself a realistic person. It might sound conceited, perhaps overly optimistic, but it's not a stretch, Kei thinks, to say there's a chance that whatever is growing in his chest is mutual. The way Yamaguchi smiles at him, the way he seeks him out, the way he's been next to him for so much of his life, by choice... It means something, even if Kei isn't sure exactly what. 

And Kei knows there's an even larger chance that even if it isn't mutual and Kei confesses, Yamaguchi will apologize and the atmosphere between them will change, slightly, but they'll still be friends. Kei has said more terrible things to Yamaguchi and he's still here despite them, and even if finding out his feelings are unrequited might hurt Kei, he knows that ultimately it won't matter, as long as Yamaguchi is still his friend. As long he's still by his side.

But there's another chance - miniscule, Kei knows, or at least far less likely that either of the possibilities - that Yamaguchi will be disgusted, or feel too guilty, or  _something_ , and their friendship will collapse underneath the weight of Kei's confession. That Kei will have to start walking home in silence, spend his Sundays at home alone, eat lunch with no one else next to him. 

Kei's never disliked being alone, wears headphones when Yamaguchi isn't around so no one tries to speak to him, but he doesn't like it more than he likes Yamaguchi. And if Yamaguchi's out of his life completely, he doesn't know how much he could keep enjoying it, with the knowledge that Yamaguchi won't ever be coming back looming over him.

Over the last year, the way Kei thinks has changed in a lot of ways - something about courage, and not being afraid of failure, and trying - but this is different. (Which makes sense, because everything with Yamaguchi has always been different.) Something like losing a volleyball match, having all of his time spent practicing rendered useless because he couldn't do well in one game - he's learned to accept those possibilities, to play anyway, because it's stupid to half-ass his time he spends in volleyball club because he's spending time in volleyball club either way. Those possibilities, they're things Kei can handle, losses he can use to motivate himself, or at least look back on and be happy he tried.

Yamaguchi isn't anything near that. Losing Yamaguchi isn't an acceptable possibility; no matter how unlikely it is, Kei knows it's something he can't ever risk. Maybe it's important to know that to do anything worthwhile, you have to accept that there are things you can lose, but it's just as important, Kei thinks, to know the difference between the things you're willing to lose and the things you're not.

Still.

He does think about it, sometimes. Telling Yamaguchi. The possibility that their feelings are mutual. The universe where he can have him.

That kind of forlorn yearning - in retrospect, that's probably the reason he did it, a couple of days ago. When he accidentally heard something from the news in his living room about how that Thursday would be the best time to view a meteor shower, and texted Yamaguchi without even thinking about it. Even though it had been years since the last time they'd gone out to look at stars, even though he wasn't even sure Yamaguchi still was interested in things like that, he texted Yamaguchi.

Sitting on the grass, sharing a telescope, staring up at the sky together... It teems with romantic implications, ones he missed years ago because they were both too young and Kei was never one to think even passingly about love until he started feeling constrictions in his chest. But thinking about it now, and all the significance of it, maybe that's exactly why he felt so compelled to ask Yamaguchi stargazing on a whim. Because if Yamaguchi said yes to something so overtly romantic, if they did something so overtly romantic  _together_ , they may as well have been dating. 

But it... isn't. Kei doesn't do things like that anymore, lying to himself, and he knows that "might as well" means almost nothing. It's... the way Yamaguchi used to look like when he looked at stars, how it would ignite curiosity in Kei even when he was younger, even though he knew he wouldn't feel what Yamaguchi felt when he saw what he saw.

Kei wants to see Yamaguchi like that again, breathless and happy and so excited that it's like Kei isn't even there.

Funny to think that in all that time they spent staring at the sky, all that time Kei spent trying to understand the way Yamaguchi felt on those nights, he'd just been looking at the wrong thing.

Yamaguchi reacted the way Kei expected when he suggested they take Akiteru's telescope and go out at night; texed Kei  _huh? we havent done that in yrs!!_ and  _dont you dislike that stuff? :o,_ but ultimately, wasn't averse to the idea, even as he warned him that watching meteor showers meant they'd have to wait a while and that they'd be out later.

Sitting next to Yamaguchi, cross-legged in the grass, he realizes Yamaguchi wasn't lying about waiting. They came here about ninety minutes ago, and Yamaguchi had set up the telescope, told him that if they were out, they may as well look at all the things that are worth looking at in the sky. He'd fallen back into his thirteen year-old self quickly, handling the telescope and juggling it and the star charts and the flashlight they'd brought with ease, like he'd just done it yesterday.

For a while, it was like a repeat of all the times Yamaguchi had come out with Kei, Yamaguchi fiddling with the telescope and calling Kei over to look at all the cool things he found, Kei sitting still and watching Yamaguchi. Seeing him move like that - it was different from the way he moves during float serves, every action exuding a precise kind of determination, the way he walks next to him, in large, unfocused strides - it was like he was dancing, like there was a beat behind them, a tune he loved motivating him as he completed the routine he knew like the back of his hand.

It wasn’t quite the awestruck image that was powerful enough to make Kei rethink the things he thought he knew, to reach across years and make Kei act on a nearly inexplicable whim, but Kei can’t deny that he missed seeing it, all that time Akiteru’s telescope sat untouched in a barely lived-in bedroom. Strange how Kei didn’t realize, but Kei hasn’t been exactly been eager to put names to his emotions, the past few years.

Still, Yamaguchi isn’t doing that anymore. The meteor shower decided to take its time, and Kei guesses even Yamaguchi can’t be entertained in front of a telescope forever. When they did this when they were younger, Yamaguchi always ended up settling down next to him eventually.

“Hey, Tsukki…” Kei hears Yamaguchi say, and he’s snapped out of his thoughts. “Do you like astronomy now?”

Kei inhales. “I don’t,” he replies, deciding the question isn’t worth lying to Yamaguchi about. If he asks why he asked him to watch the meteor shower with him, Kei will… figure something out.

Yamaguchi laughs, the sound loud and warm in the cool night air. “I knew it! You’re just as terrible at pretending to care about it as you were when we were kids, you know?” Kei doesn’t answer, and Yamaguchi continues, “I’m glad you suggested it, though.”

Kei doesn’t plan on speaking again, is content to let the conversation drift into comfortable silence as they stare at the sky, but then a question finds its way to the tip of his tongue, and he can’t let it sit there. “Yamaguchi, do you… do you still like astronomy?”

“Eh?” Yamaguchi says, and Kei can hear the wrinkle in his nose. “Why?”

“You stopped asking,” Kei says, and then when Yamaguchi doesn’t reply, starts to wonder if he was unclear and amends, “To borrow the telescope.” _To come out here with me_.

Even if it’s been years, Kei guesses he’s always wondered. Still, it isn’t… something to have a complex about. Even without the stars, it isn’t as if they’ve drifted apart. And it isn’t as if this is something that’s been plaguing Kei, but but he can’t help the tinge of wistfulness in his tone.

It takes a long time for Yamaguchi to reply, far longer than usual. “Back then, I…” Yamaguchi breathes, slowly. “I don’t know if you remember, what we talked about the last time we went out, how I should join astronomy club and you don’t like space, but… I thought you were trying to tell me to stop annoying you.” Kei hears Yamaguchi shift next to him. “I was afraid you might get sick of me. I was wrong, though! Since we’re still friends now. But… in middle school, I’d...”

Kei wonders what it is about the night sky that urges them to be honest. That makes Kei hear a thousand responses in his head he could never let himself voice: _I’d never get sick of you. You’re my best friend. I used to think you’d get sick of me, but you never did. And then I stopped thinking that. How could I get sick of you if I like you? I like you. I like you. I like you-_

Yamaguchi coughs. “Still, I… You’re kind of right, you know? I guess stars aren’t the same as they used to be, for me. Maybe I just liked them so long because I liked coming out here with you. It’s…” He pauses. “It’s kind of like when you know someone a long time, right? Like, maybe the first time you see them, you think ‘Wow, they’re really pretty!’ or ‘This person looks really strange!’ but after a while, it’s just normal, and you can’t even remember the way you felt the first time you saw them.”

Kei closes his eyes.

“I don’t hate it, though. I had fun today!” Yamaguchi says. "Actually… isn’t it kind of nice, in its own way? It's been years since we've gone out like this, but the stars and everything, they're still here. Just like they were when we were kids." Kei opens his eyes again and glances at Yamaguchi, who's resting his elbow on his knee and his chin in his palm, a nostalgic sort of smile just barely visible in the dark. "It's like they'll be here forever."

"Don't stars become black holes?" Kei hears himself ask.

Yamaguchi laughs, leans over and elbows Kei's side. "Don't ruin it, Tsukki," he says, but there isn't a trace of annoyance in his voice. "Just that... they've been here so long. And they'll still be here for a long time. It's... nice."

Kei looks at Yamaguchi, his silhouette in the dark. "It is," he says.

Yamaguchi doesn’t answer, just leans over and rests his head against Kei’s shoulder the way he used to when they were younger. When Kei turns his head to look, Yamaguchi is grinning up at him in a way that’s begging Kei to tease him for it because any insult would roll off of him anyway.

Kei exhales in a way that’s nearly a laugh, but he doesn’t shake Yamaguchi off, and they sit there like that, silence spreading over them like a warm blanket. Kei’s thinking about how comfortable this is, how it doesn’t start the thumping in his chest because it would ruin the serenity of the moment, when the sound of gentle snoring starts coming from his right and he realizes he forgot to account for the fact that serenity and Yamaguchi aren’t two things that often go together.

Kei almost laughs. He wonders if this is what Yamaguchi meant about comforting.

Eventually, Yamaguchi wakes up, in no part because of Kei even though he’s glad he can finally restart circulation in his numb shoulder. When Yamaguchi fully wakes up, he starts complaining to Kei about how he just let him sleep, and they start talking again, Kei making fun of Yamaguchi for falling asleep and Yamaguchi pretending to be miffed. It's like an inversion of their usual relationship, one of those strange things that happens late at night, but Kei knows Yamaguchi isn't taking his words to heart at all.

Yamaguchi is about to elbow him when he freezes, and before Kei can ask what's wrong, he yells, "It started!" Yamaguchi's hand finds its way to Kei's shoulder, pulling him closer to his side, and his other hand stretches out with his arm. Kei follows it with his eyes, find the meteor shower they've spent so long waiting for, and it doesn't impress him, just something reminiscent of a weak, continuous firework. But that doesn't matter.

What matters is that it impresses Yamaguchi. Yamaguchi and his wide eyes, his mouth hanging open just slightly, the awe that he can't even form into words. After years, after countless times doing this, the night sky still evokes that ineffable reaction from Yamaguchi, and for the first time, when Kei sees it, he knows exactly how he feels.

And it’s true that Kei's spent his whole life worrying about things out of reach and things he can't afford to lose, but the sight of Yamaguchi in this moment – bathed in moonlight, constellations across his cheeks, stars in his eyes - makes his mind go blank except for a powerful urge to press his lips to his.

Before Kei realizes it, he's leaning in.


End file.
